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Stop Using noreply

ryanhoover.me

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Re: Stop Using noreply

#11

Post by nhangen »

greenyoda wrote: post #4

"I replied and we shared a short conversation where I learned the meaning behind the name Quibb. Fun. :) And she does this for all new users. Bravo, Sandi! As Sandi has demonstrated, the Internet doesn’t have to be faceless. We need to stop communicating with robots." This idea doesn't scale very well. If you're a struggling little company that's trying to hold on to a handful of users (Quibb is currently "invite-onl…

I don't agree. I've personally emailed every single one of our IgnitionDeck customers, about 20% of which reply. It takes maybe 2-3 minutes extra per reply. Initially, I used TextExpander, and later, Intercom.

These are paid customers though, so were I offering a free service I probably wouldn't have done so.

Re: Stop Using noreply

#12

Post by nhangen »

I agree. It doesn't require anything extra to use an email address that accepts replies. Even if they go into a dark hole and are never read, at least you aren't sending a message that you don't care what the receiver thinks.

When I receive a no reply, I assume that the company doesn't care about my opinion as it relates to their communication, and in that case, I share the sentiment. It leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

The exception, I suppose, would be something like an Amazon email notifying me of related products.

Re: Stop Using noreply

#13

Post by [deleted] »

Skalman wrote: post #2

The post talks about sending personal emails. While that may be possible for smaller companies it doesn't really scale. At some point a company will have to use more automated email. However, I think that you should really consider whether email is an acceptable means of supporting customers/users. If it is, why not have Reply-To: support@example.com? It has happened on several occasions that I have questions regardi…

[deleted]

Re: Stop Using noreply

#14

Post by sudonim »

rmaccloy wrote: post #8
sudonim wrote: post #5

I love that Sandi does this. However, it doesn't scale. I signed up on the 18th when her blog post about it hit HN. I didn't get a personal email from her but I had the expectation to after reading the post. :/ I'm trying to figure out how to make this type of thing scale beyond your first 100 customers, and I've come up with a few thoughts. 1. Don't create that expectation of a personal connection. This is the most…

Even if the reply-to just dumps responses into a customer support queue, that's better than 90% of mass mail is doing. Separately, I think it's great if you can have all of your employees involved in the support and outreach process, but that's a cultural thing and thus a bit harder than changing a mail header.

Yes, I think all employees involved is a huge win. In our company of 3, we do that. But one thing that's problematic from the customer's point of view, is:

"Who should I contact to solve my problem?"

The ideal experience in my opinion is a single contact point, with the authority and knowledge to solve every issue you have.

That's of course unrealistic, but I want to find a way to approximate that. The closest thing I've heard is Alla Klein:

http://code.dblock.org/alla-klein-a-fake-person-in-charge-of...

Re: Stop Using noreply

#15

Post by eli »

rmaccloy wrote: post #8
sudonim wrote: post #5

I love that Sandi does this. However, it doesn't scale. I signed up on the 18th when her blog post about it hit HN. I didn't get a personal email from her but I had the expectation to after reading the post. :/ I'm trying to figure out how to make this type of thing scale beyond your first 100 customers, and I've come up with a few thoughts. 1. Don't create that expectation of a personal connection. This is the most…

Even if the reply-to just dumps responses into a customer support queue, that's better than 90% of mass mail is doing. Separately, I think it's great if you can have all of your employees involved in the support and outreach process, but that's a cultural thing and thus a bit harder than changing a mail header.

My startup never uses no-reply and someone reads pretty much every reply.

But note that this is not zero cost. The time your support staff spends deleting out of office replies and spam is time they aren't helping real people.

Re: Stop Using noreply

#16

Post by frankdenbow »

greenyoda wrote: post #4

"I replied and we shared a short conversation where I learned the meaning behind the name Quibb. Fun. :) And she does this for all new users. Bravo, Sandi! As Sandi has demonstrated, the Internet doesn’t have to be faceless. We need to stop communicating with robots." This idea doesn't scale very well. If you're a struggling little company that's trying to hold on to a handful of users (Quibb is currently "invite-onl…

True, lots of ideas dont seem to scale. It is still worth trying, though, especially if you are well before the situation that would make this approach break. I write personalized thank you notes in my subscription service and it is one of the favorite parts for my subscribers.

Re: Stop Using noreply

#17

Post by mattangriffel »

It seems to me that well thought out email marketing should take responses into account as part of the funnel. That being said, I haven't seen any good examples besides just forwarding responses to a customer service queue, as rmaccloy mentions.

The point of email marketing is that it scales, and you can do testing. One on one communication is almost the opposite. Companies shouldn't have to choose between one or the other.

Re: Stop Using noreply

#18

Post by _delirium »

I vaguely agree; when I see that wordy explanation about "this is sent from a blah blah replies won't be blah blah" I tend to read it uncharitably, even though I know why they do it. My first read of it, somewhat involuntarily, is along the lines of: wow, these people can't even deal with the use-case of someone replying to this email, and are so befuddled by the possibility that the best workaround they could think of was to tack on this wordy disclaimer in the email, begging people not to hit "reply".

Re: Stop Using noreply

#19

Post by sandimac »

It's definitely not easy to do at scale, if possible at all. I'm still in the early stages with the product, so at this point (and with this particular type of product) the personal, un-scalable approach makes sense. The style of email that I sent to Ryan, and the one that I describe in the post that he links to, is only for people that are arriving through 'warm' connections (e.g. a colleague told them about the site), versus arriving through twitter, search, etc. For completely cold connections, I use a slightly less personal approach. I shared a post about that here last week, and there were some great comments - http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4527094. That method still requires some effort from a real person, but doesn't include any actual 'research'.

Re: Stop Using noreply

#20

Post by jakeludington »

eli wrote: post #15
rmaccloy wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if the reply-to just dumps responses into a customer support queue, that's better than 90% of mass mail is doing. Separately, I think it's great if you can have all of your employees involved in the support and outreach process, but that's a cultural thing and thus a bit harder than changing a mail header.

My startup never uses no-reply and someone reads pretty much every reply. But note that this is not zero cost. The time your support staff spends deleting out of office replies and spam is time they aren't helping real people.

It's trivial to filter out of office messages if you use a decent email program. The false positive rate should be as close to zero as you can get.

Reading every feedback email from every real user teaches you how to create better products. If you make it clear users can provide feedback, there's an opportunity from them.

I ask every single real person who leaves my service why they left, which translates to about 12 emails from me per week. Most of the time, the feedback isn't actionable, but 2-3 of every 50 emails translate to something I can use to make my product better.

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